A roller shade is a rectangular panel of fabric, or other material, that is attached to a cylindrical, rotating tube. The shade tube is mounted near the header of a window such that the shade rolls up upon itself as the shade tube rotates in one direction, and rolls down to cover a desired portion of the window when the shade tube is rotated in the opposite direction.
Rotation of the roller shade is accomplished with an electric motor that is directly coupled to the shade tube. Recently-developed battery-powered roller shades provide installation flexibility by removing the requirement to connect the motor and control electronics to facility power. The batteries for these roller shades are typically mounted within, above, or adjacent to the shade mounting bracket, headrail or fascia. The motor may be located inside or outside the shade tube, is fixed to the roller shade support and is connected to a simple switch, or, in more sophisticated applications, to a radio frequency (RF) based system that controls the activation of the motor and the rotation of the shade tube. These RF based systems typically need an antenna to transmit and receive RF signals and associated cabling to connect the antenna to a controller. Unfortunately, these RF based systems suffer from many drawbacks, including, for example, poor performance, need for a large area for an antenna, increased costs, increased complexity, and/or the like for the antenna and cabling.